Dear admirers,Hi. My name is Jabez, and I m writing to you from, well, you
wouldn t believe me if I told you. Try to get past the possible theological
implications of your receiving a letter from a guy who's been, say, out of
touch for over three thousand years. Just take this note for what it's worth
and, please, no hard feelings. Okay? I'm here now to set the record straight.

YOU NEED TO KNOW THAT THERE HAS BEEN A TERRIBLE MISTAKE
IN REGARD TO MY PRAYER! It's tough to know where to begin. I guess first
I'd like to express my appreciation for all the great publicity I've
gotten recently. Thousands of years buried back there in I Chronicles
4, mired in lonely obscurity, and then, BOOM!– I'm the most famous
Bible character on the planet! At least it seems that way. Who would
have ever thought? "Jabez" EVERYTHING these days - books, CDs, diaries,
journals, videos, musicals, Bible covers, calendars, T-shirts, even ICHTHUS
fish and crosses with my name emblazened inside. None of this was my
idea, honest! Christians sure can be creative, though, can t they?

When Bruce Wilkinson' s little book The Prayer of
Jabez (Multnomah, 2000) took off like a Philistine arrow
I was caught by surprise. Truth is I haven't been following the latest
religious fads in recent
decades. There was this big scare about 1988 - a bunch of reasons why
Jesus (not Jabez, please!) would return to earth that year. Guess their
reasons weren't that great because when I got around to following up
about twelve years later, a new countdown had began for "Y2K"! Took me
a while to figure out what those symbols meant. The ancient Hebrew rendering
of that makes no sense whatsoever. Fortunately that was off the mark
as well, because 2001 was my "breakout" year. I mean, had Y2K been it,
I would have been left behind for sure. I wonder what new Second Coming
fad is out there now....

Anyway, I said "fortunately" just now, but maybe that's
not the best choice of words. Even as I write, I m getting a bunch of
dirty looks up here. It's not so much jealousy, mind you, it's just that
they know something that I know that you don't know, and when I tell
you what they and I know that you don't know, well you may not like it,
you know?

I keep getting those looks so I guess it's time to come
clean. Oh, it's been such fun lately . . . I hate to see it end now.
I thought that the ride might last a little longer, but a Hebrew professor
down at Ozark Christian College in Joplin, Missouri, got wise to me,
and now the word's starting to get out. And I always thought Joplin was
such a nice place, close to the Precious Moments chapel and all. I know
I'm stalling here....

Well you see, it's like this. I never really exactly
prayed what you wonderful folks are now calling, "The Prayer of Jabez." Wish
I had, but I didn't. I never asked God to "keep me from harm" or "keep
me from evil." Never asked that I might not "cause pain to others." Never
thought of it really. But what a prayer that would have been! No wonder
people have gotten all worked up. Especially since it says God granted
that prayer. Now exactly what's involved with that, I haven't the foggiest!
I mean, wouldn't that be like a life-long security contract? "God kept
him from harm/evil." There's no time limit stated, so I guess it s a
life-time deal. Hallelujah! I'd take that, who wouldn't? Frankly, the
way it's understood now doesn't even make good sense. Granted, my expertise
in life involved herding animals, not dissecting theology. But this whole
idea just doesn't fit the rest of Scripture–not my Old Testament,
not your new expanded edition.
So what's the missing piece of the puzzle here? Well now we're back
to what that Ozark professor discovered. His name is Larry Pechawer,
and
he's written all the detailed arguments down in this book of his, The
Lost Prayer of Jabez. (Sounds a bit over-dramatic to me, but on
the other hand, my original prayer has been "lost" for more than two
thousand years now!) I'll tell you the bottom line right now and if
you want
to get the embarrassing details check out lostjabez.com.
I believe that his is the first correct translation of my prayer ever
made in
English
(or in any other language for that matter– and I check every hundred
years or so to see if anyone has caught on to me). Even those old Greek
Septuagint translators blew it, and things just got worse from there.

I really hate this. Once you see what I prayed, NO CHRISTIAN
IN HIS RIGHT MIND WOULD PRAY MY PRAYER! I'm toast! But, please, don't
blame me. It's just one of those mix-ups that occur every couple of thousand
years or so. The ancient Old Testament text really is quite reliable,
you know. Really it is. It's just that when the later Jewish scribes
added markings to help future generations pronounce the words (Hebrew
was originally written without vowels, but, Hey! you knew that.), they
messed up on one teensy–eensy little word right there in my prayer!
What are the odds? Frankly no one would have cared a few years ago. But
now that it's the most quoted verse on the planet, i' s sort of a big
deal–no fault of my own.
Everybody knows I prayed for more territory ("Enlarge my territory!" right?).
But now folks are starting to catch on to the second half of my prayer.
I needed a special kind of land– lush, productive pasture land.
You see, the Hebrew word that those later Jewish scribes (called Masoretes)
pronounced MERA‘AH, "from evil," is really the word MIR‘EH, "pasture
land"! The original Biblical Hebrew text read MR‘H (no vowels,
remember? And just in case you don t know, that <‘ > letter
is pretty much silent, just pause and go on.).
People should have caught on long before that Pechawer fellow did (a
Moabite name?). After all, the Hebrew verb that all those English translations
have translated as "KEEP (me from evil)" never means "keep from" anywhere
else in the many hundreds of times it's used in the Old Testament.
It's a quite basic word meaning "do, make, provide, prepare." Fits
just great here once people get past the "MERA‘AH" roadblock
and recognize what I really said: not "and keep me from evil," but
rather, "and provide
me with pasture land." That lostjabez.com web
site gives a lot more information and evidence, but you get the idea.
No hard feelings? Other
Hebrew professors are starting to jump on the "Dump Jabez" bandwagon.
But really, this one's a no-brainer once you see the evidence lined
out. This whole thing about me has been, well, a big mistake.

That's it from here. I feel better, I guess. You see,
a number of things that the Wilkinson book says are okay, as far as that
goes. Some people are praying more because of all this, I think. I hope
that's not just a fad. Some of the principles of the "Jabez movement" can
be found in Scripture, no doubt. They've been there a long time. They
just don t come from my prayer. Sorry, wish they did. I am concerned
about the formulaic approach some have taken toward my prayer. That should
end now. Repeating "provide me with pasture land" surely will not catch
on! Oh well, some of the frowns around here have now ceased. Why, I even
think I see . . . , wait, was that a smile?